Page:Satires, Epistles, Art of Poetry of Horace - Coningsby (1874).djvu/69

 Despite Tigellius and his ape, whose song Is Calvus and Catullus all day long.
 * "But surely that's a merit quite unique,

His gift of mixing Latin up with Greek," Unique, you lags in learning? what? a knack Caught by Pitholeon with his hybrid clack? "Nay, but the mixture gives the style more grace, As Chian, plus Falernian, has more race." Come, tell me truly: is this rule applied To verse-making by you, and nought beside, Or would you practise it, when called to plead For poor Petillius, at his direst need? Forsooth, you choose that moment, to disown Your old forefathers, Latin to the bone, And while great Pedius and Corvinus strain Against you in pure Latin lungs and brain, Like double-tongued Canusian, try to speak A piebald speech, half native and half Greek!
 * Once when, though born on this side of the sea,

I tried my hand at Attic poetry, Quirinus warned me, rising to my view An hour past midnight, just when dreams are true: "Seek you the throng of Grecian bards to swell? Take sticks into a forest just as well." So, while Alpinus spills his Memnon's blood, Or gives his Rhine a headpiece of brown mud, I toy with trifles such as this, unmeet At Tarpa's grave tribunal to compete,